Thursday, February 14. 2013

I had the opportunity to see the premiere of LEGO Batman: The Movie - DC Super Heroes Unite at the Paley Center for Media this week, followed by a panel with Jon Burton (director/producer), Jeremy Pardon (Director of Photography), Clancy Brown (Lex Luthor), Troy Baker (Batman), and Travis Willingham (Superman), moderated by Gary Miereanu (Publicist, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment). As a fan of the LEGO Batman video games, I was interested to see how that universe translated to a full movie. The result turned out to be better than expected, thanks to solid writing, good animation, and an excellent voice cast.

There has been a trend over the last decade or so to make comic book movies more serious and angst-ridden. The most obvious series to display this is Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy, which prompted Tim Burton to refer to his movies as a "lighthearted romp" by comparison. The DC animated movies have followed this trend as well: from the Begins/Dark Knight bridge Batman: Gotham Knight to the recent The Dark Knight Returns, most films have been PG-13. Even traditionally "light" superheros like Spider Man got darker makeovers in their later films. And while I appreciate a good "real world" take on these characters, I still enjoy the occasional venture into silliness (I legitimately enjoyed Green Lantern).

So it was nice to see that LEGO Batman: The Movie - DC Super Heroes Unite followed the spirit of the LEGO Batman video games. The plot was essentially the same as LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes—the movie actually started production first, but its time in post production delayed it past the launch of the game—but the animation is a lot smoother and looked great on the big screen. There were also a ton of Easter Eggs throughout the movie, including a nod to Adam West's "Shark Repellent Bat Spray" as well as one to Heath Ledger's Joker and his misfiring detonator. Much of the movie takes its cues from the 1980s Batman & Superman movies, including a LEGO-ized version of the 1989 Batman intro, and music from John Williams Superman and Danny Elfman's Batman scores. So while it was very kid-friendly, there was a lot for older fans to enjoy.

Although video game fans are going to be familiar with the cast, the only one I recognized straight away was Clancy Brown's Lex Luthor (a role he owned in the DCAU). Troy Baker was a fan of Batman: The Animated Series, and you can tell that Kevin Conroy served as his inspiration here. But it was not simply Baker doing a Conroy impression: he clearly added his own take on the character, much like Christian Bale did with his "Conroy voice" in the Nolan movies (but with much better results). Travis Willingham clearly had a lot of fun in his role of Superman, giving such an over-the-top Boy Scout performance that he was at once both serious and self aware. Charlie Schlatter's Robin was brilliant, able to make Robin silly without ever dropping into "stupid" territory. My favorite part of the movie was his near-silent squawk when Batman gave Robin a casual "nice job" near the end. The movie was full of moments like this, with small jokes threaded throughout. The only thing that didn't quite work was Christopher Corey Smith's Joker, which was almost there but felt like he couldn't quite get it locked down. There was nothing truly bad, it just wasn't quite up to the caliber of the others.

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